Accessibility in Social Media: the Division of Student Affairs Leads the Way

KENNESAW, Ga. | Aug 18, 2026

While our team has focused on guidelines and recommendations for creating accessible documents, videos, and images, the Division of Student Affairs has tackled the challenges unique to creating accessible social media content.

As our team has worked across campuses to reach as many KSU faculty, staff, and students as possible when it comes to understanding the WCAG standards our academic and non-academic content need to meet, one of the greatest joys of this work is seeing the strides other units within the university are making. There are many aspects of digital content and the need for accessibility work is great. While our team has focused on guidelines and recommendations for creating accessible documents, videos, and images, the Division of Student Affairs has tackled the challenges unique to creating accessible social media content.

We had the pleasure of speaking to Meghan Cooper and Ashlynn Gates from the Division of Student Affairs about their workflows for creating accessible social media content and how their unique blend of KSU staff and student assistants has influenced the way they tackle making accessible digital content.

When it comes to workflows for social media, Meghan and Ashlynn’s team highlighted three key checkpoints that all of the Division of Student Affairs’ social media posts must go through: running graphics through an accessibility checker, adding closed captions to any video content, and adding alternative text (i.e. alt-text) to any still images. Using their various illustrative and photo-editing programs’ built-in accessibility checkers allows them to identify and address issues such as color contrast and typography. They use Adobe Premiere Pro to add closed captions to video content, with the occasional use of in-app caption features; as posts are scheduled using Sprout Social, descriptive alt-text gets added to all images. Hitting all three of these checkpoints helps the Division of Student Affairs make their social media content as accessible as they can.

As the team that manages the Student Affairs website, correspondence to students via email, and marketing via social media, Meghan and Ashlynn’s unit quickly recognized the need for some form of accessibility training and a standardized workflow when it came to social media; this way all units in Student Affairs could create social media posts confidently on their own. It was this realization, along with the consideration of the large number of student workers utilized in Student Affairs, that spurred Meghan and Ashlynn’s team to create their Social Media Accessibility training. They also strongly encouraged all units within Student Affairs to take our Digital Accessibility and You training, with the hope that they will incorporate it into their daily work practices.

We are beyond excited about the work Meghan, Ashlynn, and all of the Division of Student Affairs have put in to create accessible social media content, and we strongly recommend you give their training video a watch. Social media content accessibility can be intimidating, but don’t let that deter you—especially when you have such an excellent resource at your disposal! Between modeling Student Affairs’ three checkpoints system, watching their Social Media Accessibility video, and brushing up on the Basic Four of Digital Accessibility, you’ll be better equipped to incorporate accessibility into your social media workflow.

We would like to extend a heartfelt thank you to Meghan Cooper and Ashlynn Gates for giving us insight into their process for posting on social media, as well for creating such a useful resource.

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